


Neither Healthy Nor Safe

by fredbassett



Series: Stephen/Ryan series [98]
Category: Primeval
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-05
Updated: 2016-02-05
Packaged: 2018-05-18 10:06:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5924451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fredbassett/pseuds/fredbassett
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lorraine gets a glimpse of what her boyfriend gets up to at work.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Neither Healthy Nor Safe

“Richards, what the fucking hell were you playing at?” Ryan yelled, torn between admiration for his subordinate’s skill and his desire to bollock him into the middle of next week for shear sodding insanity.

“Killing it, I hope,” Blade said as he pushed the bloodied carcass off him and came to his feet in one smooth movement, hands red, and green eyes glittering with emerald fire. “You had just authorised deadly force, boss.”

Blade stared down at the still-twitching corpse of something the scientists had been wholly unable to put a name to and a lazy smile spread across his darkly handsome face. Ryan knew that look. It meant the mad fucker had almost certainly got his rocks off as he dived headlong in front of a creature that bullets had been conspicuously failing to stop. The brute looked like a cross between an alligator and a pitbull terrier, without the redeeming features of either and it had been heading straight for a pair of terrified kids backed up against a high wall with nowhere left to run.

Ryan just shook his head in disbelief and clapped Blade briefly on the shoulder. The man was by quite some margin the maddest fucker that that Ryan had ever had under his command but, psycho or not, Blade never endangered his teammates or any other third parties and had an impressive track record of pulling off stunts that would have had any sane person – even by special forces definitions of sane – crapping their pants.

“Well done,” he said quietly. “You saved those kids’ lives.”

Blade’s pupils were so dilated now that his eyes appeared almost black, with just a halo of green shadowing the edges. With lazy movements, like a bloke who’d just had a bloody good shag, Blade wiped his Fairbairn-Sykes clean on the leg of his own combat trousers and sheathed the knife.

Ryan wondered if Blade realised that the entire sequence of events had been captured on the CCTV feed of the local police station across the road. He just hoped that Claudia was already on the case to take possession the footage and pass the whole thing off as a serious breach of the Dangerous Wild Animals Act.

He also hoped that someone had managed to stop Lorraine Wickes watching her boyfriend’s antics on screen.

****

“Bloody hell,” Connor breathed, a look of complete amazement on his face.

“That was neither healthy nor safe,” Lester commented. “I shall rely on you to make sure that footage doesn’t end up on YouTube, Miss Brown.”

Her colleagues’ words washed over her as Lorraine fought hard to stay in possession of her breakfast.

It had been sheer coincidence that had enabled Connor to hack into Wiltshire Constabulary’s security feed in time to catch the denouement to the day’s operation just as Lorraine had walked into the atrium at the right – or should that be wrong? – moment to see exactly what her boyfriend got up to in a day’s work. It was actually her day off, but she’d managed to leave her young cousin’s birthday present in the office and had come in to collect it before going shopping.

Oh, she’d read the reports, so Niall’s actions didn’t exactly come as that much of a surprise. She’d also overheard the rec room talk, even though the rest of the team did tend to rather clam up on the subject around her, but none of that was the same as seeing something like that for herself.

Lorraine drew in a long, slow breath, waited long enough to be sure that Niall had not been injured, and then made her way step by difficult step to the nearest toilet where she was promptly, and very thoroughly, sick. As she was splashing cold water on her face after rinsing her mouth out, the door opened to admit Claudia, holding out a packet of polo mints.

“Thanks.” Lorraine took two and popped them into her mouth.

“Keep the packet,” Claudia said. “He really is insanely brave. You should be proud of him.”

“I am,” Lorraine said, with perfect truth. “But I’m also not stupid, Claudia. I know perfectly well Niall’s brain is wired differently to other people. It’s not that he has a death-wish. You don’t pass Selection if you’re that way inclined.” She shrugged, not knowing quite what she was trying to say. “I’ve stopped trying to work it out. All I know is that when we’re together, he’s a sweet man who phones his grandmother every week, buys me silly little presents, cooks my tea when I’m working late and plays with my nieces and nephews for hours on end without complaining.”

Claudia smiled and pulled Lorraine into a quick hug. “That’s what matters, remember. And don’t forget that he saved those two kids’ lives. I saw the footage as well. He was right, bullets weren’t stopping it. Niall did something no one else could have pulled off. He didn’t hesitate, he just did it. The fact that he enjoyed it really doesn’t matter.”

“No, I don’t suppose it does,” Lorraine conceded. “Don’t tell him I saw what happened, Claudia. I don’t want him worrying about what I might think.”

Claudia nodded, and Lorraine knew the other woman understood.

****

Lorraine turned the key in the lock and pushed open the door with her elbow as she manoeuvred the bags into the hall and licked off her shoes.

“I’m home, Niall!” she called, knowing from the rhythmic sound of chopping in the kitchen that he was busy preparing a meal.

She dumped the laden bags on the table and sniffed appreciatively. He made simply the best spaghetti Bolognese she’d ever eaten. He’d been home long enough to have almost finished preparing both the sauce and a salad to accompany the meal. He was wearing a pair of old, very faded jeans and a sloppy black teeshirt that left absolutely nothing to the imagination as far as his muscular arms were concerned.

“Give me a minute and I’ll be done here,” he said, giving her one of his rare smiles. “I’ll give you a hand to put that lot away.”

Lorraine slipped her arms around him and kissed him on the cheek. Shaving clearly hadn’t been a priority, and he was sporting his usual impressive five o’clock shadow.

“It smells wonderful. Have I got time for a quick shower?”

“There’s no rush, this’ll keep as long as you want.”

He finished chopping a mound of tomatoes and slid them into the pan and then reached for a handful of fresh basil.

In the time it took Lorraine to have a very quick shower and change into a pair of loose pyjama bottoms and one of Niall’s old shirts, he’d washed up all the chopping boards and kitchen implements, put the shopping away and poured her a large glass of chilled white wine.

The meal was delicious, and all her offers of help with clearing up afterwards were gently refused. By the time she’d finished her second glass of wine, the kitchen was immaculate.

“Have you got room for a chocolate brownie?” he asked, with a shy smile.

He’d only recently got into baking and, much to Lorraine’s amusement, he was exceedingly good at it. Something about the process seemed to appeal to him. He described it as a combination of precision and complete guesswork, the latter a consequence of the fact that she desperately needed a new oven.

“Can I have it with ice cream?”

The brownie was utterly delicious, meltingly soft in the middle, with a hint of orange zest for added flavour. Exercising considerable restraint, she refused a second one.

Much later, cuddled together on the sofa, Niall rested his head on her shoulder and slipped his hand into hers. “I’m sorry you had to see that CCTV footage.”

She sighed and squeezed his fingers. “How did you find out?

“I walked in on Connor when he was trying to wipe the security footage of you in the atrium.”

Lorraine rubbed small circles in the back of his hand with her thumb. “You saved those children’s lives. I’m proud of you and don’t you ever dare think otherwise, Niall Richards.”

He turned his face to her and smiled; a wide, genuine smile that owed absolutely nothing to an adrenalin rush or a near-death experience.

She pressed her lips to his and, as the kiss deepened, Lorraine let images of blood and violence slip away into the shadows of evening.

No one had ever said falling in love with a special forces soldier would always be a bed of roses, but regardless of his affinity for danger, death and sharp, pointy things, she knew that Niall Richards would never let her – or anyone else – down.

And she really was very, very proud of him.


End file.
